Nutrition: Classroom Plan
As part of promoting the values of good nutrition, children are invited to have one lesson entirely dedicated to a variety of vegetables, fruits, meats, and eating habits in general. It is considered relevant and vital since eating habits, although they can change throughout a young person’s life, nevertheless affect life every day. Incorrect eating habits can lead to stomach problems (too many fried foods and oil) and intestines (too little water, fruits, vegetables, and fiber) (Alderman & Fernald, 2017). The issues of anorexia, bulimia, and obesity are common, based on improper eating habits or psychological problems in this background.
For this example, the audience will be a group of children and the classroom will be the outdoors of a farm during a field trip. The purpose of the lesson is to familiarize children with food diversity and instill in them the values of a healthy diet. It is considered essential to start the lesson with the easy task of compiling a food alphabet. Children will remember the foods they like to eat and match them to the cards on the slotted board. This part has no other purpose than to support the children before the central part of the lesson and stir them up, so do not go into details about the composition of the products or their usage.
Next, the teacher should explain to the children that they will have a farm tour to see many domestic animals and how people grow fruits, vegetables, and berries. During this time, children should be explained how people can make others from some products (cheese, for example, from milk); farmers can help. Children possibly, want to touch the fur of some animals; neither children nor animals must be frightened.
Tasting cheese, milk, or fruit can be an essential part of your stay on the farm. Before tasting, you should pay attention to whether children have allergies to certain products. The teacher can warn parents about the upcoming excursion and ask if they have any concerns or recommendations. Let the children comment on the taste of the food and ask each other about their favorite flavors; the teacher must be involved. The final step of this lesson will be the preparation of light snacks. To begin with, given the age of the children, it is necessary to familiarize them with cards on which products and their names will be depicted; light snacks can include cold cuts, salads, and more. With the help of cards, children, under the guidance of teachers, choose products for cooking and then go directly to the table. Let teachers or farmers do all the work with knives; they only need to give the children the opportunity to place food on a plate or mix them.
Oral Health: Classroom Plan
Dental care is the foundation of any person’s hygiene, but most children find it boring. Moreover, sometimes children talk about the pain caused by the friction of the gums on the brush (Xiao et al., 2019). Many children dislike the minty taste of toothpaste and are not yet very good at breathing while brushing their teeth. It is essential to calmly talk with children about the dependence of their well-being and external beauty on dental health.
The purpose of the lesson is to teach children to correctly name the parts of the mouth and brush their teeth. The class is supposed to be equipped with suitable drawings and layouts to better demonstrate the problems of dental care to children. It is proposed to start the lesson by considering the drawing of the mouth and teeth, possibly separately. This drawing should be bright and large to attract children, and the teacher should explain the mouth structure in plain language.
The next step may be to familiarize children with simple terms: gums, teeth, tongue, lips, palate, and many others. Children may be amused by this topic, as they will try to repeat the teacher’s movements and make sounds. It is essential to maintain a calm and friendly environment and allow children to have fun. Separately, the issue of hand hygiene should be touched upon, which is vital in the topic of nutrition mentioned above. The teacher must ensure that curious children do not feel their gums and tongues with dirty hands during the lesson. It is necessary to explain the danger of infections and the complexity of their treatment.
In naming body parts, it is crucial to allow children to call them by their proper names so that adults around them understand them. This way, they can more easily explain their pain, and adults, in turn, will be able to provide support to them more quickly. After that, you should move on to the model of the tooth (made of plastic, hardboard, or paper-mâché) and let the children see it closer. It is necessary to explain how to brush children’s teeth. It is better to use a mock toothbrush for this, but in the absence of another option, the teacher can use a similar bar, a short pointer, or a regular ballpoint pen.
As part of using the model during the lesson, it is crucial to give children the opportunity to work with the tooth on their own and practice the movements of the toothbrush. The final part of the lesson is to memorize a song or poem that will tell the teacher exactly how the children should brush their teeth. Emphasis should be placed on the circular movements of the toothbrush. The teacher should try to present the process of brushing teeth as exciting and, at the same time, meaningful.
Child Abuse: Policy Improvement Plan
The considered changes are essential for preventive measures against child abuse. This topic remains a hot topic in society, as some families keep acts of child abuse secret. Children cannot tell teachers or psychologists about beatings and harassment, not only because of fear but because of a lack of understanding (Seddighi et al., 2019). As part of implementing the child protection strategy, concrete steps are proposed: home visits, active condemnation of corporal punishment in schools and kindergartens, and parent-child days. Home visits help teachers ‘intrude’ into the lives of families and look at how children coexist with their parents and in what conditions future members of society grow up. After such visits, the teacher is obliged to take notes about what he saw: the house’s cleanliness, the presence of animals, older people requiring care, and more.
The condemnation of corporal punishment should be clearly and loudly actualized in the speech and position of the teacher. Children should understand and remember that such education methods are unacceptable in a civilized society. As part of the confirmation of teachers’ words, it is proposed to introduce child-parent days on Saturdays to observe how kids behave with their parents. Such activities will provide an opportunity to talk a lot with the parents of children.
References
Alderman, H., & Fernald, L. (2017). The nexus between nutrition and early childhood development. Annual Review of Nutrition, 37, 447-476.
Seddighi, H., Salmani, I., Javadi, M. H., & Seddighi, S. (2019). Child abuse in natural disasters and conflicts: A systematic review. Trauma, Violence, & Abuse, 22(1), 176–185. Web.
Xiao, J., Alkhers, N., Kopycka-Kedzierawski, D., Billings, R., Wu, T., Castillo, D., Rasubala, L., Malmstrom, H., Ren, Y., & Eliav, E. (2019). Prenatal oral health care and early childhood caries prevention: A systematic review and Meta-Analysis. Caries Research, 53(4), 411–421. Web.
